Iron Lynx beats WRT for 24 Hours of Spa win

In a final that would be worth of a Hollywood movie, given the level of drama, Iron Lynx not only conquered its first TotalEnergies 24 Hours of Spa, but also made history, as Alessandro Pier Guidi, Nicklas Nielsen and Côme Ledogar broke a 17-year sequence without a Ferrari winning overall at the Ardennes classic, as the No. 51 Ferrari 488 GT3 Evo beat a WRT squad that couldn’t be more at home in the sixth round of the 2021 FANATEC GT World Challenge Europe season, which also opened the Intercontinental GT Challenge calendar.

The initial moments of the race had the No. 88 AKKA-ASP Mercedes and the No. 63 FFF Lamborghini taking some distance from the rest of the pack as they were using the first minutes and laps to settle in their positions, especially as the No. 34 Walkenhorst BMW was holding the field progress from third place.

The first neutralization of the race came with nearly 30 minutes, as the No. 21 Rutronik Porsche, the No. 71 Iron Lynx Ferrari and the Nos. 114 and 163 Emil Frey Lamborghinis had a heavy accident at Radillion. All drivers were transferred to the medical center with no major injuries, but given the size of the damage around the area, it took 45 minutes of full course yellow and an extra period of Safety Car.

The rain that was already flirting with the Ardennes track during the weekend hit it right after the first caution, messing up the order as some entries were caught with the wrong tires for the occasion, with the No. 37 WRT Audi taking the lead, the No. 4 HRT Mercedes becoming second and the No. 88 AKKA-ASP Mercedes going down to fourth, while the No. 63 FFF Lamborghini went to ninth.

Even during the early part of night time driving, the No. 37 was in total control, though the No. 88 and the No. 51 Iron Lynx Ferrari were hot in the chase as the No. 38 JOTA McLaren tumbled down the order due to penalties for abuse of track limits, which were a constant during the race. As the race was getting deeper in the night, most of the pit strategy plans were already off the line, mostly because of yellow flags, but include penalties, crashes and so on in the account.

At the midnight, despite not being in the lead, WRT had two cards in their hands at the leading pack, with the No. 32 Audi being second and the No. 37 Audi sitting in third. While the top-4 were doing a round-robin in the lead, eventually a glitch in the No. 37 took it out of the challenge, so the No. 63 established itself in first, only to see the No. 51 go to the lead again in the final hours of darkness once it gave position to the No. 32 thanks to a clever move.

With 15 hours of racing, a huge blow was dealt again into AKKA-ASP’s fortunes, as this time a rear suspension failure made Jules Gounon bring the No. 88 Mercedes back to the garage, only for the French team to see it was a terminal problem and officially retire from the race, literally leaving the No. 51 Iron Lynx Ferrari battling directly with the No. 32 WRT Audi, while the No. 95 Garage 59 Aston Martin was the outsider still in contention from third place, while most of the field was already being lapped. Another Mercedes to present trouble was the No. 90 from MadPanda, as a puncture ate a lot of their advantage in the class, although the Spanish team was still able to keep the Silver Cup lead.

Later on, a whole class got into trouble as the only two Am Cup entries found incidents on their ways. First, contact at the chicane for the No. 166 Haegeli by T2 Porsche with the No. 31 WRT Audi, which gave the class lead to the No. 23 Huber Porsche, which then lost control and crashed at Radillion, bringing a lengthy yellow flag period.

The rest of the morning saw the No. 32 WRT Audi closing the gap on the No. 51 Iron Lynx Ferrari, and at the eminence of the overtake, the Italian team opted to bring the car early for a full service at noon. Iron Lynx’s response was putting Nicklas Nielsen from Hour 20 onwards, to at least stay in the lead and keep a marginal gap.

The final moments had both teams committing to their plans, with Alessandro Pier Guidi in the No. 51 while Dries Vanthoor was in the No. 32,  but none of them were exactly counting with a late shower at the circuit, which just got stronger at the final hour after stopping on Hour 22, causing a huge pileup at the Chicane, and handing the lead to the No. 32 WRT Audi, which took the right gamble on wet tires while the No. 51 Iron Lynx Ferrari remained on track with slicks, and with a full course yellow  and Safety Car called, the Italian team lost the most in the whole situation.

All looked lost in the final 20 minutes, but Pier Guidi closed down on Dries Vanthoor and passed the Belgian with less than 10 minutes remaining, in a mix of risk assessment and a more stable driving under treacherous conditions, needing only to bring it home once it opened distance to the Audi.

TotalEnergies 24 Hours of Spa - Race results

The No. 90 MadPanda Mercedes overcame all sorts of scary stuff that happened to them to win the Silver Cup out of eleventh overall, managing to always stay ahead of the class competition when problems appeared. In the Pro-Am Cup, AF Corse was in command all the time and won with the No. 53 Ferrari and had the No. 52 Ferrari joining in the team’s 1-2. The No. 166 Haegeli by T2 Porsche was still good enough to end the race and get the Am Cup, being the only car of the class to see the checkered flag.

Pier Guidi, Ledogar and Nielsen now lead the Endurance Cup table with 71 points against 56 points for Weerts, Vanthoor and van der Linde. Vanthoor and Weerts keep the GT World Challenge Europe lead with 131 points against 82.5 of Raffaele Marciello.

The FANATEC GT World Challenge Europe calendar continues with the Sprint Cup round at Brands Hatch, as the British venue will return to SRO action on 28 and 29 August. The Endurance Cup comes right after, with the Nürburgring round confirmed for 5 September at the moment, and the Intercontinental GT Challenge will return on 17 October with the Indianapolis 8 Hour.

PHOTO: SRO/Patrick Hecq